“STIR up, we beseech thee, O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people; that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works, may by thee be plenteously rewarded;”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“Preparing for Our Lord’s Return”

This beautiful collect is famous for its call for God to “stir up … the wills of thy faithful people.” Archbishop Cranmer used this old Latin prayer in our Book of Common Prayer. In this collect, we ask God to stir up our wills, the “wills of thy faithful people”, so that in “bringing forth the fruit of good works”, we may be rewarded plenteously by God himself.

I have heard today called “stir up” Sunday. These words are inspiring. We hereby ask God to move us into action by quickening our wills. The will is the part of ourselves that moves other parts of ourselves into action. Think of this as cranking a lawn mower. Before it is started, the lawn mower has an engine, blade, fuel, and physical structure holding it all together. But one thing is lacking – getting the thing to start doing what it is made to do.

So it is for us. We have reason, memory, and intellect; we have body, spirit, and all things necessary to love and to serve and to obey Almighty God. But until we are spurred into action, until our wills are stirred up, we are all potential and no actuality. In this prayer, we ask God to move us, to start us, to get us going so, in the words of the thanksgiving after Mass, “we may continue in that holy fellowship, and do all such good works as thou hast prepared for us to walk in.”

As Christians, we need to do more than sit pretty and receive God’s grace. We are called to respond to God’s love; we are to do that which God would have us to do. We are to “bring forth the fruit of good works.”

We pray this prayer on this Sunday, the Sunday next before Advent, for a reason. During Advent, we are to do works of holiness and righteousness; we are to prepare to receive the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

In the season of Advent in the Christian Year, the faithful look back and remember the first advent of Christ as a baby in Bethlehem and look forward to the second advent (or second coming) of Christ in power and great glory as He returns to put an end to suffering, misery, and death and gloriously fulfill His mission of saving His people and creation.

Advent is a time of compassionately looking back and expectantly looking forward. Traditional practices of preparing for the coming of our King include lighting the candles of the Advent wreath, omitting our joyful Gloria in Excelsis at Mass, changing the liturgical color to purple and rose, singing Advent hymns, giving for missions in mite boxes, and preaching on the Four Last Things.

What are the “Four Last Things”? They are death, judgement, Heaven, and Hell. According to medieval and modern tradition, these are preached on the four Sundays of Advent. This is part of preparing ourselves for Christ’s arrival, both in the past in His Incarnation and in the future when He returns again.

The ancient tradition of preaching on “The Four Last Things” on the Sundays in Advent (Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell), goes back to the early medieval period, more than a thousand years ago. The Four Last Things were explicitly mentioned in a Confession of Faith at the Second Council of Lyons in 1274. More than a hundred years later, Saint Vincent Ferrer particularly emphasized the Four Last Things in his preaching. He died in 1419. Since that time, it became embedded in the traditions of Holy Church.

First Sunday of Advent – November 30th – the subject is death,

Second Sunday of Advent – December 7th – judgment,

Third Sunday of Advent – December 14th – Heaven, and

Fourth Sunday of Advent – December 21st – the subject is Hell.

They are called the four last things because these are the four last things until Christ returns for the Last Judgement, when He will finally and permanently separate the sheep from the goats, the wheat from the chaff, and the elect from the damned. We are not gloomy when we consider these serious subjects, preparing for one of the most glorious times of the year, Christmas. Instead, we take our joy and our preparation to meet that joy seriously.

As we acknowledge that we will die, be judged, and go to either Heaven or hell, so we encourage ourselves to build up what is weak in our lives, repent of our sins, and strive to more fully love our God and our neighbors. We are reminded that whether we like it or not, whether it is a polite topic or not, each one of us will die unless God returns again first.

And whether we like it or not, once we die, Christ will judge us. This is inevitable as we come face to face with our maker. Simply being confronted by the ultimate being who is love himself, our faults and lack of love will become more evident than ever before. And after the judgement, we will end up in either Heaven or Hell. There is no third place where we will spend eternity. We will live with God forever or not. It is that simple.

These sermons are supposed to examine these last things before Christ returns and inspire us to bring “forth the fruit of good works” so that we of God may “be plenteously rewarded.” We are to change our behavior and conform to the model of Christ our Lord. We are to live our lives now as if we truly believed Christ was coming soon, because the fact is that Christ will return, and with His return, this broken mortal life as we know it will disappear into the glory of immortality.

In the words of St. Peter in his second epistle,

But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.

We do not know when Christ will return, only that He will return. And when Christ returns, if you are anything like me, you will sorely regret that you did not spend your time now preparing for His return. For Christ has told us that He will return again and that we will answer for how we have lived our lives. He says in St. Matthew xvi.27, “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.”

Here at St. Luke’s this Advent, we will follow the custom of Holy Church and prepare for the coming of Christ at Christmas and in the future. Our main goal now is to think ahead to next month on how we are going to join in the Church’s preparation for Christ’s return. What concrete steps will we take this Advent to prepare for Christ’s return?

Will you take advantage of our weekday Masses to attend an extra Mass per week of Advent?

Will you take advantage of our Sunday Morning Prayer to add to your prayer life on the Sundays of Advent?

Will you forgo listening to Christmas music to concentrate instead upon the Church’s season of Advent, of preparing to make the most of Christmas?

Will you take on the responsibility of reading a chapter of Scripture each day of Advent?

Will you respond to the sermons on death and judgement, Heaven and Hell by confessing your sins to your priest this Advent?

Will you respond to the glory of Christ’s Incarnation, or taking on of our frail human nature, to give sacrificially over and above your tithe for missions with the mite box?

Will you reflect upon your calling from God and the need of your parish to discern a new area of ministry for you to enter into?

You do not have to decide today. But Advent begins next week. How will you prepare for the coming of Christ this Advent?

“STIR up, we beseech thee, O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people; that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works, may by thee be plenteously rewarded;”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“We give thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“Baptized into Christ’s Kingdom”

We are subjects of two kingdoms. We are subjects of Christ our King and citizens of these United States, or whatever country you hail from. How we live our lives in this green land of America is both informed by our Heavenly King and will influence our life in the hereafter. Also, our life under Christ our King informs our citizenship here on earth in this great country of ours.

Now the kingdom of this world is not simply the domain of Satan, even though St. Paul does call it “the power of darkness”. The kingdom of this world is that broken part of Creation, of the cosmos, that does not claim Christ as Lord. Whereas we like to think that the saving work of Christ in the cosmos is expanding, in our own culture we see little evidence of it. Think for instance of thirty-five years ago, when the popular television series M*A*S*H sympathetically depicted a chaplain amongst its characters. Such a thing is foreign to television today.

Indeed, university students are increasingly told that their faith holds no bearing – or only poses a burden – on their education, when the original universities were explicitly Christian. Unelected judges overturn same-sex marriage bans and abortion restrictions partially on the claim of there being no reasonable or non-sectarian basis for them. In several states of this Union, courts and legislatures require citizens taking out any insurance plan to pay for elective abortions, regardless of their consciences, even though it is simply avoided.

But despite all this and the recent news out of Houston with sermons being demanded of preachers, other governments in the kingdom of this world have had it much worse. This Wednesday we celebrate the Feast of the Martyrs of Uganda, the dozens of Anglican and Roman Catholic boys who were the sex slaves of the pagan king of Uganda and refused his lustful desires. For their disobedience to the king of this world and their obedience to the High King of Heaven, they were put to death. Earlier, the king had grown angry with the missionaries from the Church of England and the Church of Rome as they kept criticizing him and his support of Moslem missionaries.

This past week in Morning Prayer, we read in First Kings about Elijah, Ahab, and Jezebel, how the righteous prophet squared off against the wicked monarchs of Israel. But before Elijah, Samuel warned Israel against having an earthly king, warning them in I Samuel viii.18: “And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day.”

Worldly governments clearly fail to set out a righteous course for us to live in. But the government of Christ the King exemplifies all good and glorious things. Our worldly governments tell us that things which are clearly wrong are right; the government of Christ the King unerringly tells us what the wrong things are with such accuracy and precision that we cannot actually avoid them perfectly.

Today’s Epistle mentions “the inheritance of the saints in light”. This refers to the Kingdom of God. In the next verse, “the power of darkness” is the antithesis of the Kingdom.

“And he is the head of the body, the church:” Coming right after speaking of “all things” and spiritual beings, this shows that the last verses here, vv 18-20, demonstrate an equivalency between the cosmos and the Church. This is tied to the universal mission of Holy Church, to bring all people to Christ and His kingdom. The work of the Church is Christ’s salvific work in the whole broken cosmos. Later in ii.10, Christ is called the “head of every rule and authority”. Christ created all and rules all, and we are members of His Body in that cosmos and Holy Church. Each one of us is part of something epic and big.

Now, there is one way into Christ’s Kingdom: Holy Baptism. We read in St. John iii.5, “Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” This is our passport, our entrance; this is how we immigrate from the kingdom of the world to the kingdom of God. When we are buried with Christ and then share in His Resurrection, we join with Him mystically and sacramentally. When Christ commands His disciples at the end of St. Matthew’s Gospel, He says,

“All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.”

Before we are Augustans, Georgians, or Americans, before we are black, white, or any other race of this world, before all these things, we are under the banner of Christ our King. By virtue of our supernatural sacramental Baptism into the life and death of Christ our Lord, we are brothers and sisters of the Nigerian schoolgirl held in some African camp more fully than we are brothers and sisters to our natural sister who does not believe. By virtue of our belief in Christ our King, we are brothers and sisters of the impoverished but faithful Haitian farmer more than we are brothers and sisters to our unbaptized brother with whom we grew up.

So what does this new citizenship look like? We read in Ephesians v.1-5:

“Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children; And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour. But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints; Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.”

First, we must walk in sacrificial loving-kindness. We must love the Lord our God with all our hearts, with all our soul, and with all our minds, and we must love our neighbors as ourselves. This is unbelievably difficult, but we have no alternative. God is love, and we are to conform ourselves to God.

Second, we are very specifically told to avoid wicked behavior. After all, Christ says, “Ye shall know them by their fruits.” So we are to avoid fornication, uncleanness, covetousness, filthiness, foolish talking, jesting. We are not to be whoremongers, unclean, covetous, or idolaters. Essentially, we are to pay attention and keep the Ten Commandments.

We are to love and we are to keep moral lives. Third, we are to give thanks. It is no mistake that each of our regular services in our Book of Common Prayer includes a prayer of thanksgiving. We are to thank God for the goodness in our lives. We are to thank God for our lives, God himself, other people, and all the goodness of God. Love without thanks is hardly love indeed.

Today’s Epistle begins, “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:”

Moving from darkness into light reminds the Christian soul of the Exodus, especially the miraculous passage through the Red Sea. While Moses his prophet stretched out his hand, the Lord caused the wind to blow on the sea, exposing the seabed so that the people of Israel could escape from Pharaoh and his army, freeing them to reach the Holy Land. So likewise, we are in bondage to sin and death in the kingdom of this world, no matter how fine it is otherwise to us. And God brings us out of “from the power of darkness”. Through the miracle of Christ’s death and Resurrection, we transfer from one side to the other.

Having passed from the old way of death to the new way of life, Christ having given us the forgiveness of sins, so we are to imitate our God and King.

The way we worship is to obey. And we become like Christ. When the early Church worshipped Christ their God, they became more and more like Christ, and they grew like wildfire. The early Christians did not visit and attend congregations to find out which ones were the most like what they wanted, asking to make the service the way they wanted, requiring the teaching to be like they wanted. In all things, they obeyed Holy Church, they obeyed their Lord and Savior, they became like Him as disciples, and they grew and spread. This is the way not only of faithfulness to God, not only of resisting the sinfulness of the world, but is also the way of evangelism, growth, and maturity.

Almost like the Anglo-Saxons of Wessex over eleven hundred years ago, our king is our best man, the man who exemplifies our ideals, the man whom we seek to emulate. Blessed Alfred the Great, King of Wessex was one such king of this world; Christ, the King of Heaven and Earth, is the king of the whole cosmos and of the whole Church.

With God, we know who is king. We know that His rule is always right and holy. We know that we have no say in His rule. And indeed, while God wants our whole selves, our souls and bodies, we actually live in great freedom, freedom from sin, death, and Hell.

God the Father calls us to live our lives in the service of Christ our King. We are to live meek, humble lives in penitence and holiness, avoiding sin, and loving our God with our whole being and our neighbor as ourselves.

“We give thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“WATCH thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“The work of the evangelist”

Why do we sing the Gospel during the Mass? Why do we stand when it is proclaimed? Why do we sometimes process the Gospel out amongst the congregation to proclaim it? Why must the Gospeller be in Holy Orders?

We read in Isaiah lii.7: “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!”

Beautiful feet? That sounds over the top. Yet over-the-top is how we proclaim the Gospel both here at St. Luke’s and in catholic churches around the world throughout the ages.

St. Luke’s Gospel tells the story of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, from before His Annunciation till His Ascension into Heaven. His is the Greatest Story Ever Told, and our patron saint, St. Luke the Evangelist, is one of the sacred four who told the story so that the rest of us might hear it.

The patron saint of our parish wrote almost as much of the New Testament as Saint Paul. He is the only Gentile who wrote one of our Gospels. According to Colossians iv.14, we know that he was a physician. As a doctor and writer of a Gospel, he is considered the patron saint of doctors and healers. His sign as evangelist is the ox with wings, giving us the name of our newsletter, the Winged Bull.

He is also the patron saint of artists. During the Middle Ages, many Guilds of St. Luke encouraged and defended artists in important cities in Rome, Flanders, and across Europe. Here at our parish, our Creative Christians group continues this tradition by encouraging both Christian art and Christian artists.

But St. Luke did not only write a Gospel leaving us inspired depictions of the life of the Blessed Mother, our Lord Christ, and the early Church. St. Luke also did the work of an evangelist by journeying with St. Paul on at least two of his mission trips, staying with him in Rome. Our patron is counted among the Seventy who Christ commissioned and sent out to do ministry in today’s Gospel lesson.

St. Luke wrote his Gospel in Greek, helping spread the Good News of Christ throughout the pagan Gentile world of the First Century. The Early Church suffered greatly for proclaiming the Gospel. St. Paul and all the Apostles save St. John met their Lord in the martyr’s death.

And lest we think that the persecution of Christians is a bygone practice, this Wednesday we celebrate the faithful Christian witness of eight Anglican clergymen whom the Japanese killed for preaching the Gospel in occupied New Guinea during World War II. Tens of thousands of priests and millions of faithful Christians died at the hands of the Communists in Russia and elsewhere in the Twentieth Century. The Moslems have killed far more over the centuries, and they are still at it today.

Closer to home, we hear rumblings of persecution. I warned in my annual report last year of coming troubles. As St. Peter writes in his first epistle, “be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:”

This week, news came out of Houston, Texas which has troubled the hearts and minds of many Christians. Let us look into what the facts are:

The city council and mayor of Houston passed an ordinance which would permit women to use men’s bathrooms and men women’s bathrooms and allowing people to file complaints with the city government if they are not allowed to use the bathroom they want.

Houston preachers and others organized a petition for a referendum to overturn the ordinance at the November election. The city government claimed that too many of the signatures were not valid and refused to schedule the vote. Christian activists then sued the city to accept the signatures and thus the petition and put the ordinance to the vote.

In response, the city’s lawyers issued subpoenas to five conservative preachers to hand over sermons to determine of any preaching related to homosexuality, so-called gender identity, or even the mayor. A subpoena is a legal writ compelling someone to appear before court or to surrender documents to the court. These preachers would now have to surrender to a law court any sermon mentioning any of these topics.

The mayor has asked if the preachers gave instructions on how to sign the petition. The city attorneys hold that the subpoenas are valid because the preachers worked to organize the repeal petition and are thus pertinent to the case.

Both conservative and liberal ministers have spoken out against the subpoenas. There has been a public outcry over the city’s actions. An interdenominational coalition of over 400 churches in Houston have opposed these subpoenas. This local action has sparked national debate. Some pastors have refused to hand over sermons.

The mayor and city attorney then agreed that the original subpoenas were too broad. New subpoenas have now been drawn up which do not ask for sermons, but rather for speeches and presentations, and do not ask about homosexuality, but still ask for other things besides those on the petition.

You may ask what a conservative pastor’s PowerPoint presentation on the ordinance has to do with the validity of the signatures on the petition. The answer is: Nothing. The city’s attorneys are still reaching beyond the appropriate legal necessity at hand, which has the effect of threatening the free speech of the preachers and the public practice of religion by the ministers of Christians.

A Christian – or another religion’s – minister preaching, speechifying, or presenting on the sexual nature of God’s Creation and on the divinely ordained morality which faithful people must practice are not crimes, do not threaten the state, and indeed support the wholesomeness, integrity, and the commonweal of the people.

The representatives of free American citizens are not called to sift through the words of religious leaders, looking for sedition. The city is not a political organization which cannot tolerate dissent. The governmental structures of this world have no legitimate role in approving or disapproving the voice of the Bride of Christ. Our American governments have no legitimate role in intimidating preachers or believers.

We Continuing Anglicans directly descend from those who were quickened with zeal by the Assize Day Sermon by Blessed John Keble at St. Mary’s Church in Oxford, in which he publicly from the University Pulpit criticized the Whig-controlled Parliament for reducing the number of bishops in Ireland without the approval of the Church of Ireland. As your priest and rector, I stand in a very long line of bishops and priests who have criticized the state when the state has had the worldly effrontery to admonish and attempt to control Holy Mother Church.

This very day last year, Archbishop Haverland sat right there and in the words of our Book of Common Prayer challenged me “faithfully to feed that portion of the flock of Christ which is now intrusted to you; not as a man-pleaser, but as continually bearing in mind that you are accountable to us here, and to the Chief Bishop and Sovereign Judge of all, hereafter.”

It would certainly please many people if we decided that we would ignore the things of God and whole-hearted accept the things of man. But that would be forsaking God by making us pleasing to men, and I have been told not to be a “man-pleaser”.

My wife once saw a person wearing button which answered an unasked naughty question with “No thanks, I’d rather go to heaven.” We lives our lives in this world, oftentimes forgetting that our lives are given to us by our good God in Heaven. We may choose to do many things. But we will be called to divine judgement one day. All choices are not the same. Some are right, and some are wrong. When we are enticed, seduced, and tempted to make a wrong choice, it is good for us to say, “No thanks, I’d rather go to Heaven.”

I know you. I know that most of you won’t budge if this Houston business happened here. You know me. You know that I won’t budge if this happened here. We know our archbishop. We know that he won’t budge if this happened here.

And this hasn’t happened here in Augusta. Indeed, we elected a preacher of the Gospel as our mayor. But this has now happened in these United States. My dear children of God, I would rather you live your lives in peace, but I tell you this day that we will soon be facing worse, and not just in Texas, but here on the banks of the Savannah River. Our sister parish across the river, All Saints’, Aiken, witnesses to the Gospel in a state where a Federal court might force their county to issue marriage licenses to people of the same sex. Dark days are coming.

We here at St. Luke’s will continue to preach the Gospel of Christ our Lord, especially to those who need to hear it. Many stories are told of the old Roman martyrs, some of whom are named in our Mass, who witnessed to their tormenters and executioners to great effect, converting souls in the Holy Name of Jesus.

If anyone in this world wants to know what I preach, come here to St. Luke’s most any Sunday at 10:30 and hear for himself. I even put my sermons up on a webpage. I would love for everyone out there to hear me preach about our Lord and Savior!

The government can hear our public proclamation. Those who try to order us about and deny us our freedom both to practice and proclaim the True Religion of Christ are the ones who need to hear it the most. We shall not back down. St. Luke our patron did not back down. St. Paul did not back down. Fr. Keble did not back down, and neither did the faithful gathered together at the Congress of St. Louis in 1977.

We at St. Luke Church are uniquely positioned to proclaim the Holy Gospel to souls in peril here in Augusta as the times grow darker. We preach the unadulterated truth, the whole Gospel, all the Sacraments, without Roman and Eastern doctrinal accretions, and we do so in the traditional language of this nation.

Everything St. Luke wrote was to tell other souls about Christ. He commended Christ to everyone at all times. He wrote down timeless truths about our Lord that the other Evangelists did not record. When we stand under the name of the Evangelist St. Luke, we stand for spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And like St. Luke, we are not only to sit down and tell other people about Christ, but we are to get up and tell people face to face, traveling to them to share the good news of Christ our Lord.

After St. Paul says in today’s epistle, “WATCH thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry”, he continues and says “For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.”

The day is coming when we will have to answer for our faith in Christ. That day may come when we draw our last breath and slip beyond the veil of this mortal life, when we will face the individual judgement. Jesus will look at each of us and know what we have done with the life He suffered and died to save, that life which the Holy Ghost bestowed with graces.

Or the day is coming when someone out there will make us chose to follow the world or to follow Christ. Maybe someone will try to seduce you into sexual sin. Maybe a crook will tempt you to help him commit a crime. Maybe your own elected government will coerce you to deny Christ and follow the popular godless way.

Will you stay the course and profess your faith in Christ when your livelihood and social standing are threatened? Will you stay the course and profess your faith in Christ when your life is required of you? What will you say when they come to coerce you to renounce your faith? Are you able to say that today?

“WATCH thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“Baptism, Death, and Life Everlasting”

In the Easter bulletin, I wrote:

Today is the most glorious day of the entire Christian Year, the Feast of the Resurrection, Easter Day. Jesus Christ, Son of God yet fully man, defeated the powers of sin, Satan, separation, death, disease, despair, and decay by dying for us and then rising from the dead.

Christ invites us to join Him in His Resurrection. We who are Baptized die to our “old man” of sin and are given new life – Resurrection life – in Christ. We are being transformed by God into loving, virtuous, and holy men and women, overcoming all manner of barriers and obstacles as only God can do.

I invite you to follow along with this theme of us joining with Christ in dying to sin and rising to Resurrection life.

In St. John 12.24-25, Christ says:

Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.

In Baptism, we die unto sin so that we may bring forth much fruit.

In II Timothy ii.11-13, St. Paul shows that we are mystically joined with Christ:

It is a faithful saying: For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him: If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us: If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself.

Looking to today’s Epistle, found on page 197 of your Prayer Book, St. Paul writes that the old man is put to death in Baptism, in which we are ‘identified’ with Christ in His Resurrection. The Christian’s very self is transformed into a creature which can live the life Christ demands of us, the life to which we are called, a life in which sin and death have been put to death..

Let’s look at the Epistle lesson verse by verse.

3 KNOW ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Being Baptized into Christ establishes a bond between the one Baptized and Christ. The person is now on the record for Christ.

This bond allows the person Baptized and Christ our Lord to share suffering and dying and Resurrection. Christ does not merely claim the person Baptized. According to Scripture, Christ shares His death and then Resurrection with the one Baptized. Christ did not only defeat sin in His death, but Christ has brought the one Baptized into that death and victory over sin. The one Baptized does not share a metaphor or analogy with Christ; he actually participates in Christ’s death and victory over death.

4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. “Buried with him” actually means in Greek, “co-buried”. We who are Baptized not only die with Christ, but we rise again with Christ.

Our new life is the Resurrection life of Christ. We go beyond identifying with Christ’s life in Holy Baptism to actually living Christ’s life. Christ is more than our Lord; we share His holy and divine life. That means that we begin to live out Christ’s holy and divine life in our own lives. We do not say the Summary of the Law or the Ten Commandments at the beginning of the Mass to torture us with something unattainable. We say them so that we always keep in front of us a reminder of how we are supposed to live.

5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: St. Paul here uses the image of a branch grafted onto a tree so that they form one living creature.

Likeness here means a mold. Have you ever had the dentist make a mold of your teeth? A tray of liquid material is pressed against your teeth until the liquid hardens. The material is removed, and a reverse form of your teeth has been made. The mold is made in the likeness of your teeth, perfect in form, but different in material. So it is that we are joined with Christ in the Sacrament of Baptism to experience His death and defeat of sin, while yet we remain ourselves. We do not lose our individual identity. Our self which God created is good. It is sin which is evil.

Just as we fully share in Christ’s death in Baptism, so too we share in Christ’s Resurrection. After all, Christ’s death and Resurrection are two sides of the same act of loving-kindness, of sacrificial love.

6 knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. The “old man” is our old self. This self was part of the old order of the world, where sin was in our nature and Satan ruled. This self was ruled by selfishness and stood condemned before God. This self was crucified and buried with Christ through Holy Baptism.

This “body of sin” was the self which was oriented towards the things of this sinful world and not the things of God. This was us shut off against the generosity of the Father, the sacrifice of Christ, and the life of the Holy Ghost.

Because our sinful self was put to death with Christ, the “old man” of sin is dead and rendered powerless. The part of us that looked to this world for our meaning, to ourselves for our pleasure, and to Satan as our ruler has been put to death, and with that death, the power of sin over us has been broken by Christ on the Cross. Christ sets us free from sin.

7 For he that is dead is freed from sin. On the Cross, our sinful self died and thus is no longer capable of sinning. Being dead with Christ, we are free from sin. Our twisted internal nature bent towards sin has been crucified with Christ.

8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him: To the world outside, nothing happens at Baptism. But with the eyes of faith in Christ, new life occurs. We cannot see this under a microscope, but rather in the kingdom of loving-kindness heralded by Christ in His death and Resurrection. Even we who are Baptized will not realize the full life in Christ until He returns again in power and great glory. We know that we can begin living with Him now, but we believe that we shall live with Him fully for all eternity.

9 knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. When Christ arose from the grave, He did not simply start drawing breath after three days without. He broke through the wall of death and entered into Resurrection life. This is human life in the presence of God the Father. Those who are revived will eventually die. Those who are resurrected will never die again. Christ will never die again, and having defeated death, He now rules over death where once Satan held sway.

10 For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. The Passion and death of Christ is a unique event in all of the cosmos for all time. Christ conquered death. We who are Baptized into Christ’s death and Resurrection are freed from everlasting death. We who rise with Christ through Baptism enter into a new relationship with God the Father – now we relate to the Father through the Son, onto Whom we are grafted like a branch to a tree.

The final verse: 11 Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. St. Paul calls us to increase our faith in Christ so that we may more fully live in Christ through our Baptism. The faithful Christian cannot consider sin acceptable because God will forgive us. We have been joined with Christ in both His death and His Resurrection. Since our “old man” or “body of sin” has been crucified with Christ, we are dead indeed unto sin. We no longer are reliable sinners.

If we voluntarily allow ourselves to sin, we rupture our relationship with Christ which He bought for us on the Cross and applied to us in this Holy Sacrament of His Body the Church. If we sin, we break our relationship with Christ, knowing full well what it cost Him to reach us. We are with Him in a mystical union, and we rip ourselves away from Him when we sin. Knowing what His sacrifice cost Him, how can we dare to hurt our beloved benefactor and savior? How can we not only break His heart but rend His Body?

But have hope, you who are Baptized in Christ! With Him, we have passed from death unto life everlasting! We are united to Christ, Who is God the Son sent by God the Father to take up our mortal nature so that He might redeem us in His death and Resurrection. If we hold fast, stay the course, and keep the faith, we too will finish in great unity with God, with never a fear again of death, sickness, and decay. Alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord, we shall live for Him and in Him forever and ever. Amen.

“Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“Speaking the wonderful works of God”

God has spoken to Man throughout the ages. God communed with Adam in the cool of the morning. God accepted Abel’s sacrifice but not Cain’s. God commanded Noah to build the Ark. God chose Abraham and sent him on his journey, communicating to his through angels. God spoke to Moses from the burning bush to lead the Exodus of the Jews from Egypt and gave him his sacred Law. The tabernacle of the Ark of the Covenant signified the presence of God to the priests and people of Israel.

Yet even when the Ark was lost, God still spoke through the prophets of Israel, correcting and admonishing the priests, kings, and people when they grew lax with God’s Law and sought to worship themselves instead of God. These prophets and the calamities visited upon the Israelites scattered many of them but sharpened and honed others.

Out of these others came Ss. Mary and Joseph, Ss. Elizabeth and Zacharias, and those who waited for the consolation of Israel. The Son of God the Father became Man in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary as the Holy Ghost came upon her and the power of the Most High overshadowed her. God raised a great prophet in the elderly womb of St. Elizabeth. As her son, St. John the Baptist, preached and prepared those hoping for the restoration of Zion to receive their king, Jesus grew in stature and wisdom until his Baptism by St. John and his ministry amongst the Jews.

Thus we understand the first two verses of Hebrews: “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds;”

As we have worshipped in the cycle of Holy Church through the preparation for Easter, Pre-Lent and Lent, and thence through Passion Week and Holy Week, worshipping through the Passion, death, Resurrection, and then Ascension of our Lord Christ, so we come to the time Christ promised us: Pentecost.

“WHEN the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.”

Christ gave the Holy Ghost to the Church to hold her accountable to what He taught her. We are given the Holy Ghost in the Sacraments to bring God’s presence into our lives and accomplish all things necessary for holiness. The Third Person of the Holy Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, instructs us, seals us in the knowledge of God, and preserves the teachings of Jesus Christ.

From the Confirmation rite found in the Book of Common Prayer: “Strengthen them, we beseech thee, O Lord, with the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, and daily increase in them thy manifold gifts of grace: the spirit of wisdom and under-standing, the spirit of counsel and ghostly strength, the spirit of knowledge and true godliness; and fill them, O Lord, with the spirit of thy holy fear,”

Zechariah vii.11-12: “But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear. Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the LORD of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the LORD of hosts.”

St. John iv.22b-24 “…Salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

Romans viii.9-11: “But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.”

I Corinthians ii.9-10, 12: “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God…. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.”

We are comforted – strengthened – by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit also leads us into all truth. The two come together in that teaching of Christ, that the Holy Ghost will preserve and keep us in the word of God from Christ. He “brings all things to remembrance”.

In the Collect, God “didst teach the hearts of thy faithful people, by sending to them the light of thy Holy Spirit” and we beseech God to “Grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgment in all things”.

Teaching the hearts of the faithful and granting us right judgement are both brought about by the first thing St. Peter does after receiving the Holy Ghost at Pentecost. He preaches.

He preaches that those who have not heard may hear. He preaches that those who do not understand may understand. He preaches that those who fail may be strengthened to succeed. He preaches that the faithless may find faith. He preaches that the stout-hearted give glory to God and lead others to glorify God as well. He preaches by telling the truth that the authorities do not want to be told. He preaches by speaking the wonderful works of God.

Will you stand up alongside the great apostle and speak the wonderful works of God?

“Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees; when they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand. So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Judgement

In the Tuesday night Bible study we have been reading the fifth chapter of St. Mark. In this chapter, people fall down before Christ and worship Him. One is a demoniac; another is a leader of the synagogue; the third is the woman with a hemorrhage. Reading about them and studying the Gospel, I have often asked myself how they, alone of all the people around them, knew to bow before and worship Christ.

So when I think of the end of today’s Epistle, which recounts four Old Testament prophecies of Gentiles worshipping the Lord, I again wonder how folks recognize divinity and whom to worship. I learned about God from my earliest days. My mother first took me to church in her womb, I was Baptized as an infant, and I remember early days standing next to my father as he sang hymns in worship and praise of God.

I did not have to judge whether or not to give worship to God then. But I had to do that later, as I was becoming a man. Then I had to look around and figure out what all this foolishness was about. I cannot speak to every person’s reasons, but I came to a lively faith in Christ as an adult after acknowledging the wisdom of my fathers, the logic of belief in philosophy, and, importantly, through the generous and self-sacrificing acts of love and goodness on the part of a Baptist coworker.

Did you see what I did? I measured Christ and found that He fit. This is a terribly arrogant thing to do, but in this world and in my life I needed convincing over and above my raising. The same thing happened when I felt called to become a Catholic. I had to use my judgement, poor as it was, to determine where God was calling me. Indeed, I spent too long as an Episcopalian and could have become Anglican Catholic years before. But I didn’t, which shows how we can make faulty judgements which God will correct over time. We are never so old or so wise that our judgement is unimpaired and perfect. We are never so old or so wise that we don’t need correction from time to time.

In the Office of Institution which the archbishop read right here almost two months ago, we read:

“And as a canonically instituted Priest into the Office of Rector of —— Parish, (or Church,) you are faithfully to feed that portion of the flock of Christ which is now intrusted to you; not as a man-pleaser, but as continually bearing in mind that you are accountable to us here, and to the Chief Bishop and Sovereign Judge of all, hereafter.”

According to the Book of Common Prayer and Archbishop Haverland, I am to bear in mind continually that I am accountable to him here on earth and to our Lord, “the Chief Bishop and Sovereign Judge of all, hereafter.”

An explicit part of my work here as rector is to hold myself up for judgement by our bishop and by Christ. I shall be judged both here on earth and there on the Day of Doom, that is, the day of reckoning or day of judgement.

When we let ourselves be held accountable by others, we hold ourselves up for judgement. Mrs. Gladys Fox and Mrs. Sam Nechtman have done excellent work straightening and keeping up our financial records over the past year and a half. Last year, their work was scrutinized by a committee led by Mr. Leroy Walker for the explicit purpose of holding their work accountable. They voluntarily held themselves up for judgement. And their work was measured and judged to be excellent. This is judgement.

When we behold the fig tree and see that it now shoots forth leaves, then we remember that trees shoot forth leaves during Spring. Thus we arrive at the judgement that Summer is nigh at hand when the fig tree shoots forth leaves.

We measure the observed event by what we already know and that results in a judgement. We observe that we have lied to our sweetheart, we remember that lying is a sin, and thus we derive from these two facts the fact that we have sinned. This is what Christ refers to when He says in St. Matthew vii.1-2: “Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.”

The measuring stick by which we judge others is the same one by which we shall be judged. Therefore even being selfish, we ought to show others great all-encompassing mercy so that Christ will show us great mercy at the Last Judgement.

Yet we do not do this. Oh, sometimes we do. Perhaps we have grown more generous over time, a mark of spiritual maturity. But we perceive things incorrectly. Even the best and most spiritual Christian views himself with poor eyesight. As St. Paul says in I Corinthians xiii.12, “For now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”

We see through a glass darkly; we know only in part. When we get to Heaven after Christ’s Judgement of us, then we shall see “face to face” and “know even as also I am known.” But for now, we know imperfectly. And we know ourselves less perfectly than we would ever suppose.

Indeed, each of us should understand that the “old man” inside of you, the struggling sinful man inside of you, keeps you from seeing yourself clearly. If you hearken unto God’s Word and live the life of Christian adventure working diligently at your prayers and confessing your sins regularly, then you stand an excellent chance of understanding what is right and what is wrong.

But despite this, being a frail and fallible human being despite your wisdom and strength, you will misjudge yourself often and regularly. We dare not trust our own judgement of ourselves. And it is precisely because we shall be judged by Christ with the standards with which we have judged others that we may experience a profound grace from Christ regarding our failed confessions. Showing mercy to our struggling brothers, sisters, and neighbors is how we judge in the loving-kindness with which Christ died for us on the Cross.

We must have compassion on our fellow creatures because we must adjust our judgement to Christ’s, and Christ is the Incarnate God, and, as St. John tells us, God is love. This is why the two great commandments are to love God and to love our neighbor. The two are inextricably bound together, tighter than the tightest knot. God created us to love us. God came down to earth to love us and save us. God taught us to love each other and to love him too. If we would behold our vilest neighbor as Christ beholds him, then our hearts would melt with divine love. We would give him the choicest seat, kill the fatted lamb, and put a ring on his finger. We would never in a million years – which is but a drop in the bucket of eternity, by the way – keep recounting past acts in ways that exalt our own role and denigrate our neighbor.

And this is the type of thing I hear all the time in this parish. I recognize it because it is one of my sins too. But Christ will damn us for this sin if we do not release it. We can have no part of it. We must throw it down at the feet of Christ, fall on our knees, and say,

“ALMIGHTY God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Maker of all things, Judge of all men; We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, Which we, from time to time, most grievously have committed, By thought, word, and deed, Against thy Divine Majesty, Provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us. We do earnestly repent, And are heartily sorry for these our misdoings; The remembrance of them is grievous unto us; The burden of them is intolerable. Have mercy upon us, Have mercy upon us, most merciful Father; For thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, Forgive us all that is past; And grant that we may ever hereafter Serve and please thee In newness of life, To the honour and glory of thy Name; Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

We must thrust aside all sins and naughtiness if we dare to face Christ with certainty on that Last Great Day, when Christ will pronounce truth and Judgement over all Mankind in general and over every single one of us in particular.

Therefore, we ought to do three things:

First, we must diligently search our hearts after studying the Holy Scriptures and bathing ourselves in prayer so that we may find and repent of the many sins which are weighing us down like stones in the pockets of a drowning man.

Second, we must relentlessly practice compassion and self-sacrificial loving-kindness with every single person in our lives, particularly in our families, in our parish, and in the faces of those whom we despise. We must serve others by acting like servants for them alongside our Saviour Christ.

Third, we must conform our opinions, understandings, and judgements to those of Christ our Lord. St. Augustine said, “If you believe what you like in the Gospel and reject what you like, it is not the Gospel you believe but yourselves.” Each of us have parts of the Gospel which are hard for us to hear. For some, it is holding on to a cherished notion. For others, it is keeping score of offenses, real and imagined. For others, it is living in anxiety and fear of the things of this world. For yet others, it is trusting in this world’s goods instead of storing treasures in Heaven above. We must acknowledge before God that He is greater than we are, that he is wiser than we are, that he is smarter than we are, and so we must conform ourselves to his holy self.

So: Confess your sins, love thy neighbor, and conform to God. Do these things, and you will be in far better shape to answer to Christ our God and our King, the great Judge Eternal, on the Day of Doom, the Day of Judgement, when the disposition of all men will be made for eternity.

“And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees; when they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand. So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

“But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Death

There are three ways that we can meet the end of our mortal life here on this earth. From most likely to happen to least are: Our death, Christ’s return, or direct entry to Heaven like Enoch, Elijah, and St. Mary.

In Genesis v.24 we read: “And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.”

Not to spoil Naomi’s Sunday School, but in II Kings ii.11 we read: “behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.” Elijah did not die, but he was taken up into heaven.

According to the non-Scriptural but goodly understanding of the early Church, the Blessed Virgin Mary did not die and meet corruption on earth but was assumed directly into Heaven.

So we know that we can be taken into heaven without dying, but we have only two Scriptural and one post-Scriptural examples of this. We had better not count on God ‘miracleing’ us off of the earth.

We also know that the Lord will return one day to judge the quick – or living – and the dead. This is known as the Second Coming. This first day of that holy season, we may think of this as Christ’s Second Advent.

As Isaiah says in the thirteenth chapter, “the day of the Lord is at hand” and “Behold, the day of the Lord cometh”. As Christ says in the Gospel according to St. Matthew about the five wise and five foolish virgins, “Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh.” As St. Paul says in I Thessalonians: “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

But we still wait for Christ’s Second Advent. We do not know when it will be; only that it will be. Until then, we are left with only one expectation of how we shall meet our end here on earth: Our death.

Death is an unnatural state brought upon by Man’s Fall into sin.

In the third chapter of Genesis we read words familiar from our Ash Wednesday service: “for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” Due to sin entering into the lives of the ancestors of our human race, Adam and Eve, we suffer a debilitating separation from God, who is the only source of goodness, holiness, health, and life. Therefore, we labor under the conditions of wickedness, disease, and death.

Death is necessarily related to sin. Sin brought death into the world of men. Only by addressing sin can we effectively address death. We must understand that the cancer that killed my father twenty-four years ago is related to the sin I committed yesterday, as well as to the slaughter of the Holy Innocents by King Herod, and is only effectively met by the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross.

We cannot meet death on death’s terms without losing. On death’s terms, we will suffer violence at the hands of other people, sickness and deterioration at the hands of disease, and will die eternally separated from God in Hell forever. That is what death is. Death is a metaphysical sickness which medicine and clean living can at most delay. Death is our end without God.

Therefore, we must appeal to God to assist us with our death. We must prepare for death.

Momento mori. In Latin, that means, “Remember that you will die.” Every day we must be mindful of death if we are to prepare for death. We have heard that we ought to live each day as if it would be our last. We should not take this to mean that we ought not to plan ahead, but rather that we firmly understand that our time is the Lord’s, and he will give us what he wants, not what we think we need. We must always be mindful of our coming death. Have you heard the Coast Guard’s motto? Semper Paratus, which means Always ready. Do you remember that Scout motto? Be prepared. To be ready for our death, we must be prepared.

Part of preparing for our death is to make provision for the disposition of our earthly substance. We ought to have our financial things in order for those who will dispose of our estate. We ought to leave our valuables where our loved ones can find them. Importantly, we ought to leave plans for what type of funeral we are to have. As a parishioner here at St. Luke, you are absolutely entitled to a Prayer Book funeral, a Prayer Book committal, and a requiem Mass. These are free of charge. You may choose one, two, or all three of them. But you really ought to consult with me about them, write down what you want, and keep those instructions in a place your loved ones can find immediately upon your death.

But that is simply the beginning of our preparations for death. We must also provide for those who are dependent upon us. We must leave instructions on who should care for our minor children, an infirm parent, and any household pets we might have. Your dog or cat will still need fresh water the day of your death.

We ought also to provide for the distribution of our worldly wealth. Our families should be provided for. We ought to heed the Book of Common Prayer in the Visitation of the Sick, where it enjoins the priest “to advise the People, whilst they are in health, to make Wills arranging for the disposal of their temporal goods, and, when of ability, to leave Bequests for religious and charitable uses.”

Unclear wishes about the disposition of your property often lead to courts, and courts tend to disrupt the harmony of families. Far better to prepare ahead of time than to leave confusion and bitterness in your wake. Also important is to leave bequests for scholarships, good works, and parish support. Our parish is currently operating under a tremendous financial difficulty which is only bearable for a while due to the generosity of dead parishioners and their bequests.

Another important part of preparing for our death is shaping our legacy while we are alive. We buried a fine man this past week, Francis “Mac” MacDonald. Mac and his wife Gini left behind a formidable legacy of generosity, hard work, diligent governance, and loving-kindness. Any Christian should be honored to walk in their paths. But each of us walks his own path. You will leave behind a legacy. What will people say about you?

The final and most important part of preparing for our death is preparing our soul to meet her maker and redeemer. As best we can tell from Holy Scripture and the teachings of Holy Church, we will be judged initially upon our death and then finally upon Christ’s Second Coming. What will He say to you?

If we trust in, if we depend upon, if we rely upon ourselves, our wealth, our ideology, or anything other than Christ, we probably won’t like what He has to say to us on that Last Great Day. There is no one who can defeat death other than Christ. There is no one who loves us enough to interpose Himself between us and death than Christ. There is no solution to the problem of death other than Christ.

Christ came to us on Christmas morning to save us from death. Through sin, death entered into the world of men. Starting with Abel and lasting through this very moment, we men have died the death of this world. Little babies die in the womb. Old women die in their beds. Young men die in combat. Old men die in the hospital. We die.

But God has intervened in our situation. We need not die like those without hope. God the Father sent God the Son into the world as the Christ, the Messiah, the Savior of the world. And He conquered death. But He conquered death in a most interesting way: Christ conquered death by dying Himself. This apparently gave Satan and sin and death the victory. But no! Christ rose from the grave and killed death itself. No mythic hero of ancient literature accomplished such a feat! Christ died, defeating death by dying Himself and Resurrecting.

We who live in Him participate in the victory which He won without our assistance. When we join in His holy Body the Church, we too will experience Resurrection on that Last Great Day.

The ignorant of our society claim that Christians wish ill on the world by praying and hoping for Christ’s Second Coming. This is foolishness. We Christians pray and hope for Christ to come again soon so that death may be overcome all the sooner. We know that it will mean that we will face Christ as judge in the Last Judgement, but we so eagerly seek for death to be done for forever.

As we reflect upon our own deaths and the deaths of our loved ones, let us put on Christ our Lord and put to death our sins.

“But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.”

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.